Rain lashed and wind freely blew into Oliver's bedroom through the open glass bay windows, upon the floor Oliver lay in the throes of a nightmare.
Such dreams were rare these days but when they occurred they were bad, really bad.
Moira opened the lockless door, pushing aside the chair, after hearing her son yell – in pain or anguish or anger – she couldn't tell.
Seeing her son, drenched in a combination of the rainwater and his own sweat, shivering from both the cold and the nightmare.
"Oliver, wake up." She had to shout for her voice to be heard above the raging storm above. "Oliver…"
She leaned over to shake him gently awake, but as her hands touched her son's trembling form on his shoulder, his survival instincts switched on.
He awoke, twisting his body in one graceful movement and flipping his mother onto the carpeted floor.
His hand instinctively came down on her exposed neck just as Robert, who had followed his wife after awaking to Oliver's screams, yelled, "Oliver!"
Oliver truly awoke from the nightmare and saw his mother chocking underneath him. Half-scared at his actions and half-disgusted with himself, Oliver withdrew rapidly, kicking back until he crouched like a wild animal between the window sill and a leather chair.
"I'm sorry. I'm so… so sorry." Oliver was horrified but not entirely surprised, he could have easily killed his mother unintentionally, only a second more and he would have snapped her neck.
Usually he would have heard his mother approaching him, even over the thunder and through the deepest sleep due to his finely tuned reflexes and the Mirakuru, but being home had unbalanced him more than he would like to admit.
Robert Queen helped his wife up shakily who was still retching from the pressure Oliver applied to her neck. And they both knelt down in front of Oliver.
"No, it is ok, Oliver." Robert said, looking at his son in a whole new light, his hate for Malcolm Merlyn raising exponentially – what could have had happened to Oliver that he reacted so violently at the simple touch of another human being.
"It's all right, sweetheart. You're home. You're home." Moria continued soothingly, trying not to rub her throat where bruises would surely form.
…/|\...
Oliver pulled out Yao Fei's battered wooden box from under his bed, not the best place he would be the first to admit but he did not plan on leaving it there for very long.
He deftly undid the lock with a practised air, and he checked that all his possessions remained.
When ascertaining that there was nothing missing, he took out an arrowhead shaped rock upon a simple clack plaited cord.
He walked familiarly through the halls despite being away from many years, taking his favourite route to his little sister's room.
As he neared the door he noticed a strong perfume that was not, to his meagre knowledge, his sister's.
"Where did you get these?" His sister's voice was barely quieted by the thick hazel-coloured wooden panelling of the door
Another voice drifted through the wood, "Roxies. Thank you, Daddy's ACL tear."
With a frown, Oliver knocked on the door, more than aware what his sister was messing with, having vivid memories of his brief mission that he carried out in Starling under the wily, bordering-evil women that was head of A.R.G.U.S.
Oliver turned the ornate brass door handle and entered the room to see Thea, still in her school uniform – although admittedly it had been modified somewhat with an extremely short skirt, tight shirt and her blue tie undone – throwing a folder suspiciously upon the desk and leather-jacketed Margo stuffing something in an equally suspicious manner into her pocket.
"Ollie." At that Oliver chuckled, he had dreamed of his precious sister calling him that many times in the past five years.
"No one's called me that in a while, Speedy." He replied easily.
Thea rolled her eyes, slightly embarrassed by her brother's antics, "Worst nickname ever."
"What, always chasing after me as a kid? I thought it fit pretty well." Oliver smirked. And then with an edge to his voice continued, "Maybe it still does."
Margo sensing the tension in the air grabbed her bag and walked out but not before commenting. "See you at school, Speedy."
"Sorry about her." She said, trying not to laugh, both in embarrassment and in nervousness.
Oliver decided that it was better for him to lead the subject away from where it was undoubtedly heading, not wanting to butt heads with his stubborn sister at this moment, "I have something for you."
Oliver held up the necklace and Thea gazed at him in amazement and amusement.
"You did not come back from a deserted island with a souvenir." She said incredulously, smiling widely.
"It's a Hozen." He explained, remembering the words Shado had told him when he first found it in the cave among the bones of Japanese soldiers. "And in Buddhism, it symbolizes reconnecting. I kept it in hopes that one day, it would reconnect me with you."
He handed the Hozen to his sister and Thea took it and smiling happily at her long-lost brother.
In the corner of his eye he saw Slade looking at him; half-annoyed at the display of emotion, half-wistful knowing that he would never see his family again.
And then, in a split-second, the moment was ruined as Tommy entered the room with his usual tactlessness, "A rock! That is sweet." Oliver didn't bother to turn around and acknowledge his entrance, annoyed that Tommy had ruined the moment.
"You know," Tommy continued injudiciously, "I want one of those t-shirts that says 'my friend was a castaway, and all I got was this crappy shirt'."
He laughed gratingly as he came to a stop between the two siblings.
Thea smiled at his antics, then looked to her brother. "Don't let him get you into too much trouble." She advised. "You just got back. Take it slow." She hugged Oliver, who gave her a light kiss on the cheek.
"The city awaits." Tommy announced dramatically as the two left Thea's room.
As they walked down the hallway, Tommy looked to Oliver slyly. "Have you noticed how hot your sister's gotten?" he asked.
Oliver' rounded on him with a glare that would make most men flinch.
"Because I have not." Tommy replied his own question, holding up his hands in defeat.
Oliver followed Tommy to his grey Mercedes, keeping up the flow of banter and jokes and his playboy mask with little difficulty.
As they drove through the city, Oliver tried and failed to casually bring up his father's old factory, after his fourth attempt, he gave up all attempts at subtlety and turned directly to Tommy, "Can you drive through the Glades?"
Tommy looked at him weirdly but complied, turning on the radio with excuse of teaching Oliver of the music that he missed in the five years.
As the car rolled through the streets of the Glades; Oliver noted the lack of cars, the rundown housing, and the increased number of people huddled under bridges and on the sidewalk, homeless.
When the Queen factory rose in view, Oliver noticed, like many buildings within the Glades, that while it was structurally sound – it was slowly falling apart, decaying in its non-use.
"Your funeral blew." Tommy announced. Oliver looked over at him the mask firmly in place, and a smile that never quite reached his eyes.
"Did you get lucky?" he asked, knowing that was the response that Tommy would expect from him.
"Fish in a barrel." Tommy laughed. "They were so sad. And huggy."
"No." Oliver joked, trying to keep his face from twisting in disgust.
Tommy continued, "And I am counting on another target rich environment for your welcome home bash."
Oliver looked to his friend in confusion. "At my what?"
"You came back from the dead." Tommy stated. "This calls for a party. You tell me where and when. I'll take care of everything."
Oliver shook his head in disbelief, internally cursed himself for not foreseeing this, of course Tommy would insist on a party, that was the typical response of a playboy of Starling City – throw a party and everything would be fine.
Hating that in order to convince everyone that he had not changed, he would have to allow Tommy to not only throw him a party but that he would be expected to be there for it.
They came to a stop at a corner. Finally, Oliver had a proper view of the old, abandoned Queen steel mill, the basis for much of the Queen family wealth.
Across from them, a dilapidated building stood, with several homeless people out front standing close to a warming barrel.
"This city's gone to crap." Tommy noted. "Your dad sold his factory just in time. Why'd you want to drive through this neighbourhood anyway?" he asked.
Oliver allowed himself on last look at the factory before replying, "No reason."
Tommy shrugged and quickly drove out of the Glades, continuing the earlier conversation about what had happened while he was gone.
"So what'd you miss the most?" Tommy asked him, turning to him and grinning. "Steaks at the Palm, drinks at the station, meaningless sex?"
Nothing.
He wanted to reply, he had missed nothing – certainly in the first year he missed his family and the illusion of safety – but in the last few years he had missed nothing of his old life.
He had only returned as an excuse to leave the employ of Amanda Waller – with the media attention she would never be so stupid as to re-induct him into her service – and he returned in curiosity to see what had truly become of his family in his absence.
The poisonous Mirakuru in his veins only became stronger in the presence of those he cared about, so he refused to yield any emotional response – even with his own blood.
Deciding that there was one answer that he could say in order to fulfil a promise he had made many years ago to Sara, before he was completely corrupted by the bloody life he led, he replied, "Laurel."
Tommy stopped smiling. "Everyone is happy you're alive." He reasoned, not really wanting to see his current on-off girlfriend lose her temper at his best friend. "You want to see the one person who isn't?"
Oliver just shrugged his shoulders, he didn't really want to see her but he had an obligation to Sara to apologise for his actions and to try and let the Lances remember Sara the way she was before she boarded the Queen's Gambit.
…/|\...
As Tommy arrived at CRNI, Oliver noted that Laurel had achieved her childhood dream of becoming a lawyer.
He walked into the bustling building, disliking the amount of threats… people that he had to watch constantly.
He asked the petite red-headed receptionist with a flirty grin that he was once known for, where Laurel was and she blushingly pointed him towards a desk at the back of the building lit by the light streaming in from the cloudy glass windows.
He studied with some interest her board on Adam Hunt, a man that Oliver had only heard mentioned in passing.
A bottom-feeder millionaire who had only made so much money by ripping off his clients and had only been able to do so through a connection of corrupt officials that many of his kind took advantage of.
"We don't need to go outside the law–" Laurel was saying.
"–To find Justice." Laurel's friend Johanna finished, "You're dad's favourite jingle."
Laurel finally turned and saw Oliver standing by her desk, her smile slowly slid off her face as she regarded her ex-boyfriend.
"Hello Laurel."
Oliver led Laurel out of the building through an outdoor plaza.
"You went to law school." Oliver was stated almost regretfully, "You said you would."
"Yeah." Laurel agreed sullenly. "Everyone's proud."
"Adam Hunt's a heavy hitter. You sure you want to get in the ring with him?" Oliver was unsure how to instigate the conversation he really needed but did not want to have.
"Five years and you want to talk about Adam Hunt?" she asked irritated.
Oliver shook his head tiredly, "No. Not really."
She stopped walking and Oliver stopped with her and turned to face her with some trepidation.
"Why are you here, Ollie?" she asked resignedly. As if you don't know the Mirakuru inside him mocked her stupid question.
"To apologize." Oliver replied with more honesty than he had in many years. "It was my fault. I wanted to ask you not to blame her."
"For what? Falling under your spell? How could I possibly blame her for doing the same things that I did?" Laurel lashed out viciously
"I never meant to-" lead her to her death.
"She was my sister." Laurel cut him off so furiously that she was almost calm. "I couldn't be angry because she was dead. I couldn't grieve because I was so angry. That's what happens when your sister dies while screwing your boyfriend."
She paused for breath before continuing with an accusing tone and tears in her eyes, "We buried an empty coffin, because her body was at the bottom of the ocean – where you left her. It should have been you."
As much as Oliver wished to lash out with words of what Sara had become under Anthony Ivo and that he had tried his hardest to save her, Oliver used the strong chains of restraint that he had deliberately built in order to control his temper and the Mirakuru to calm himself enough to reply with a semblance of control, "I know that it's too late to say this, but I'm sorry."
Laurel's reply was acidic and bitter, "Yeah, I'm sorry, too. I'd hoped that you'd rot in hell a whole lot longer than five years."
Oliver was left standing alone, the Mirakuru burning within him to show Laurel her place, to show her exactly what hell had done to him in those five years.
Oliver watched as she snapped angrily at Tommy with a sharp rhetorical question as if it was his fault that Oliver had bothered to go to her and apologise, "How did you think that was gonna go, Tommy?"
"About like that." Tommy said to the empty air, wishing that he could have convinced Oliver that talking with Laurel was a bad idea. Tommy walked over to where Oliver was standing, unaware of Oliver's internal battle with the Mirakuru.
"Let's get back to the car." Oliver managed to spit out through clenched teeth.
As Tommy fumbled for the keys in the alley that his grey Mercedes was parked, he – as was his nature – tried to change the mood away from awkwardness and anger between Oliver and Laurel.
"Ok, so we took care of that. Good call. Now we can make up for lost time. If you're not too sick of fish, I suggest we find some leggy models and eat Sushi all day. What do you say?"
Oliver refrained from punching Tommy in the face but turned to him, facing the predicament of what was expected of him as a playboy billionaire verses what he really wanted to do as the survivor of Lian Yu.
A van suddenly speed down the alley way, screeching to a stop metres from them.
"What the hell?" Tommy shouted.
Two men in Halloween masks, dark hoodies, leather jackets and blue jeans with tranquilizer guns in their hands walked out from behind them. One shooting Tommy's exposed neck with ease.
As Oliver watched Tommy fall to the ground he made a decision in an instant – it was too risky to show the power of Mirakuru where just anyone could walk off the streets and see him, while he did not wish to be captured and could certainly catch any dart that they fired at him and kill them with relative ease, there was the problem of bodies and witnesses – so he allowed the dart to hit his neck.
With the Mirakuru in his system, it of course had no physical effect but Oliver, but he was well-versed in faking unconsciousness and thus pretended to collapse slowly from the dart.
A third man in a demon mask jumped out of the battered and likely stolen van, with a loaded gun, and as an over-weight dirty chef walked out with a trash bag of garbage, fired several lead bullets at the poor unfortunate man.
Oliver allowed his body to become limp and let the men grunt and exert sweat as they hauled more than 180 pounds of pure muscle into the back of the beat-up van.
He listened as one man started the van, while the other two hopped into the back with him.
Oliver contemplated killing them now while the van was moving – he could do it quietly enough so that their friend in the front wouldn't know and neither would Tommy – but he decided to continue to act unconscious, curious to what these men wanted.
They clearly had no idea about the serum in his system and the skills that he had picked up over the years.
They were clearly after Oliver Queen, the billionaire playboy, not the expert enhanced killing machine that he had become.
